Fall Creators Update hitting the home straight with focus on stabilization

Windows Insiders can also give Windows 10 S a spin if they really want.

The Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, aka version 1709, is due to be finished next month. Accordingly, the builds released to the Windows Insider Program are now heading toward stabilization, with bug-fixing the priority.

This has a somewhat greater significance than was the case for prior Windows 10 updates because of the "Skip Ahead" scheme Microsoft introduced a few weeks ago. Most members of the Insider Program will continue to receive Redstone 3 builds and head toward stabilization and finalization for the Fall Creators Update release. Those who opted in to the (limited) Skip Ahead group, however, will imminently be switched to a different Windows branch. This branch will begin development of the Redstone 4 release that's due in March 2018.

Once the Fall Creators Update release is out, all Insiders will be moved to the Redstone 4 branch, and the program will continue as before.

Even at this relatively late stage in the release's development, today's build does have a couple of new features. The most interesting is the introduction of a new font, Bahnschrift, that uses the DIN font standard that's found on road signs in Germany and other parts of Europe. The novel feature of the font is that it's a "variable font"; instead of having distinct versions for different levels of boldness/lightness, the font itself can be adjusted to be as heavy or as light as an application requires.

The Skip Ahead group can also use a new View 3D application that offers augmented reality display of 3D models using the rear-facing camera of certain laptops and tablets. Microsoft first demoed this app way back when revealing the Creators Update.

Beyond that, the new build's main aim is to fix a long list of bugs.

Today's build also comes with a new version of Windows to try out: Windows 10 S, the locked-down version of Windows 10 that is only supposed to be able to run apps from the Windows Store. The installer will only work on systems that are already running Pro or Enterprise, and it will only perform a fresh install—no settings or data preserved.